Anna Marie Laforest

Little Comedies about Death Anna Marie Laforest

16 characters find their afterlives more intricately entwined with their personalities than they had imagined. Humorous, lyrical, and based on contemporary and metaphysical theories, these stories bring the foibles of human nature into the realm of the "Just Ending." A paleontologist's wife, who is a closet collector herself, discovers that "you have to take it with you" in the afterlife. An armchair traveler melts through a wormhole in a church in Italy. A handful of people incarnate over and over, taking turns as lover, deceiver, warrior, friend. A timid woman's soul adds another version of herself each time she is frightened, and they nearly collide. A stonecutter is fought over by Saturn and Jupiter, then released. A master chocolatier dies in a seeming earthquake and walks through the rubble only to find the river Lethe. And ten more.